Emil Zatopek, Czechoslovak long-distance runner best known for winning three gold medals at the 1952 Summer Olympics in Helsinki, once told the world, “If you want to experience something, run a marathon.” Over the course of a twenty-six-point-two-mile run, a pair of running shoes will strike the ground over fifty-five thousand times. The best shoe for each runner is different but is crucial to ensure runners do not injure themselves. As more concrete gets poured and more runners join the sport, the rate of injury has also been increasing. With the increase, many running companies have changed focus from treatment to prevention. Along with all this progression, there has been a sudden movement of regression. A growing cluster of runners have started becoming minimalist running, which is running with the bare basics or even barefoot. This new trend has been creating lots of problems for runners as minimalist running is not a safe way to run in the twenty-first century. Minimalist running increases the risk of injury to the human body due to the new century environment and the unique running styles that have formed.

Most people think they know how to run, but sixty to eighty-five percent of runners injure themselves each year (Terra Plana). With a little over half of runner’s getting injured people are looking for new running ideas to help prevent further injury. Minimalist running is one of the most contested ideas to prevent injury. The new trend has many runners running in minimalist running shoes or barefoot who should not be and are getting severely hurt. With the new running trend, a new running shoe is being engineered. Running companies have changed their focus from treating injuries to preventing them creating a safer running environment for runners (Hamilton 2). Consequently, while people are trying to use less running protection to prevent injury, major running companies are making it safer to run in the harsh environment runner’s live in today. The idea that running with less protection from the environment helps prevent injury is a spreading fallacy causing harm to runners everywhere.

If the risk of injury is so high, what makes minimalist running the new fad in running? There are so many unknowns with minimalist running and people are curious to find out everything about the style. There have been many recent discoveries that people are overlooking such as the hard, uneven running environment most runners are forced to run on that most conventional running shoes are designed to dampen the effect of. Minimalist running calls for a specific build requiring a smaller and lighter person resulting in many people just by sheer weight, no matter how fit, putting themselves at risk. Also, technique is very important to making the transition from running using conventional equipment to minimalist running. Almost any professional runner or running trainer, both supporters and opposers, will explain how one must have the perfect technique before they can start minimalist running without any risk of injury. Many professionals who have made the switch have had weeks of training for every detail so they do not hurt themselves when they make the transition. Last, history is crucial to survival in conventional running and especially minimalist running which takes away the protection from past injuries which, no matter how small, can still hurt a runner. Each of the issues listed exponentially increase the risk of injury when a runner makes the decision to run minimalist or barefoot.

Many minimalist runners like to make the point humans started out running barefoot, but what they fail to realize is all the changes that have happened since the cavemen times. For example, many runners, especially city runners, are forced to run on concrete sidewalks. These concrete sidewalks are considered the second worst surface to run on, only following snow (Bloom). While some people may think that concrete does not affect the chance of injury, it most certainly does as concrete is considered ten times as hard as asphalt (Bloom). While the risk of injury is increased, it skyrockets on concrete if the runner is not given the extra cushion protection by the insole and midsole of a running shoe. Many injuries stem from “unsupportive footwear [that] can overburden” different body parts causing them to begin to tear and fail causing failure in places like the achilles tendon and runner’s knee (Fraioli 2). While asphalt is better than concrete, it is still only rated a six out of ten and is not recommended for training by running specialist Marc Bloom. The best overall surfaces to run on “are firm (not mushy or slippery), relatively flat (without camber), smooth (without ruts or holes), and provide some degree of shock absorption (Ellis 235). Majority of runners cannot escape the paved conditions or have trouble finding perfectly flat grass fields to run on. The running shoe, while “there is [no] perfect running shoe,” is “designed for different types of people, strides, feet, and types of running” creating multitudes of different running shoes (Beverly 1). Everybody has a best fit for a running shoe but with the minimalist running shoe, if shoes are worn, offer no support or cushion making a shoe have no basic shoe requirements used in even the most basic running shoes such as heel counters, heel crash pads, heel-toe offsets, toe springs, sock liner, midsole, or insole. The minimalist shoes are essentially an outsole which is basic to the point its only real purpose is to protect the runner from hazards on the ground such as broken glass or other trash. The foot in a minimalist shoe still must undergo the intensity of the pressure during the strike and must “build up toughness on the soles of your feet” meaning thick rough calluses must be formed on the bottom of the foot (REI). For minimalist runners, unless one runs on a perfectly flat rock dirt combination every time, extra support and cushioning will be beneficial to helping a runner continue running injury free. 

An increasing problem, especially in America, is a large population of people have become overweight and obese. In fact, only about thirty-one percent of Americans are at a healthy BMI per the website “Obesity in America.” Many ways people have started to try and combat the increasing rates is an easy but worthwhile sport of running. The idea that the number of runners are increasing is good news to the sport, but it can be devastating for their doctors. Some of these new, slightly larger runners are losing the weight and want to keep progressing their running ability. Some have turned to minimalist running as a new way to try something else new. While a large amount of these runners are more than likely over one hundred ninety pounds, a study was completed where runners were given a minimalist shoe and gradually increased their mileage and the control group did the same in a conventional running shoe (Hutchinson). Runners with the weight of one-hundred and eighty-five pounds were found to have four times the risk of injury than in the conventional running shoe (Hutchinson). Many minimalist runners may make the statement they are perfectly fit, but later it was also determined that the BMI has nothing to do with the increased chance of injury. Shear weight of the person alone can cause for the increased chance of injury in minimalist running shoes (Hutchinson). Some people who weigh more may never be able to “build up the toughness” required to run in minimalist shoes because the human body is not meant to have the amount of pressure many runners put on the body for as long as they do (REI). Knowing that weight plays such a large role in the increase in injury in minimalist running shoes, the average male in America, as determined by the Center for Disease Control, weighs about one-hundred ninety-five pounds putting the average male at an extremely increased risk of injury running in a minimalist running shoe. Before someone decides to begin to run minimalist running, no matter how fit, they should remember that even the most active of people can be at an increased risk of injury just by their weight alone. 

Within the running community, there are differences between many runners such as how the foot impacts the ground. There are three main foot impact patterns forefoot, midfoot, and heel striking. A study looking at the foot strike patterns of elite runners found “Rearfoot strike was observed in 74.9% of all analyzed runners, MFS in 23.7%, and FFS in 1.4%” (Hasegawa 1). The information in the study were found in elite runners but the numbers have been found to transfer to about the same percentages for everyday runners. Each foot strike pattern has unique qualities from the other. The rearfoot strike uses mostly muscle and the midfoot as well as the front foot strike use about half muscle the other half elasticity (Terra Plana). Using mostly muscle creates more strain on the muscles but normally only leaves the runner sore and has less of a risk on other injuries. Since the other two strike patterns allow for the use of elasticity, it uses the runner’s tendons to make more of bounce allowing them to use slightly less muscle, but more serious and painful injuries involve the tendons and bone (Hamilton 2). Shin splints, which is a very common injury believed to be the muscle on the shin tearing away from the bone, is an injury almost all runners have endured, but is because of the overuse and weakening of tendons that can more easily occur through midfoot and forefoot strike patterns (Fraioli 5). To transition from conventional running shoes to minimalist shoes it is considered crucial to change one’s foot strike pattern to midfoot or forefoot (REI). While changing the foot strike pattern helps to decrease the injury in minimalist shoes, it is meant to increase the bounce in the stride giving to more pressure on tendons. If someone does not change their foot strike pattern from rear strike, it can be devastating to runner creating so many problems they would most likely have to stop running for as much as indefinitely. In conventional running shoes, all the foot strikes are considered equally as dangerous by experts as each brings its own unique injuries to the table (Hamilton 2). In minimalist running shoes, runners who use the correct foot strike are still increasing their chance of injuries such as tears in the Achilles tendon and shin splints. 

If an attribute as specific as the foot strike is unique to the runner it is easily understood every runner has a unique way of running. The type of running shoe helps to protect the runner from their own unique running technique that can create different injuries for different people. Part of the reason there is no “perfect” running shoe is because it is almost impossible for the different companies to make custom orders cheap enough for everyone to afford (Beverly 1). There is still a good shoe for a unique runner, but the shoe that works for one runner may not work for another because of the different techniques of each runner. There are basic components of running shoes such as cushioning that are major factors into the variety of running shoes. The harder the shoe is the more stability, but the softer it is the more cushioning from shock (Hamilton 2). Minimalist running shoes disregard the balance of each component of the running shoe by taking it to the extreme. For instance, there is absolutely no cushioning and no heel-to-toe drop in minimalist running shoes. Both are strong attributes to preventing injury in a runner (REI 2). Running shoes have been in the engineering for over fifty years and have been focusing on injury prevention for the last thirty (Ellis 78). In this period, more people have picked up running and could run in a safe environment that was originally not safe because of the basic missing components. Minimalist runners are ignoring the new most popular runner, the everyday runner, who does not have time to risk injury because running is not their source of income, nor is it the only thing in their life. These runners do not have the time nor money to make daring change into the minimalist running shoes that are a completely new species than the shoes they have now. 

While all the previous attributes are important to remember when making the switch into minimalist shoes, if a runner has had a previous injury, does not have to be running related, minimalist running shoes can reverse the treatment and open the wound again making it worse than it was before the original injury. Elizabeth, a moderate distance runner, had previously torn a crucial ligament in the human knee, the anterior cruciate ligament or ACL. She has been running for multiple years now, but recently she started training for a 10k, approximately 6.22 miles, where her previous injury has struck a new injury in her knee, knee synovitis. This can cause extreme pains due to inflammation. She tore her ACL about ten years ago, and had thought a full recovery had occurred. Elizabeth has had to stop running and rest while going to physical therapy to fix this new and old injury. During her training before her injury, she was training in a pair of Asic Gel-Cumulus 18 which are a type of running shoes made for under-pronators who run a medium distance. Minimalist running shoes would have aggravated the knee injury to a much more extreme and caused her to leave running for as much as remainder of her lifetime while still going through physical therapy. Elizabeth’s injury was hurt by running but her shoe saved her running career by protecting her from the hard ground and inconsistent environment. Injuries, no matter how old, can return. For that reason, it is important to remember to take in to account all injuries that have occurred in the past before one even can attempt to run in minimalist shoes or one would be risking their running career over a shoe change. 

When people get hurt it does not simply affect only themselves, it affects everyone around them and can hurt family and friends who support the injured. If risk of injury can be decreased it is always worth the extra mile especially in running. When a running injury occurs, it disrupts a runner’s normal running schedule which can be hard to return to once the injury heals, if it heals. Minimalist running is still considered a significant risk and many studies are in the process of discovering the pros and cons of the new running style, meaning there is still so much to be learned before people should start trying it. Many studies have already found the increased risk for injury when minimalist running and many correlations have been found such as weight and foot strike patterns when an injury occurs running minimalist. So many runners hurt themselves every year only making life harder and, while runners like the pains of running, runners agree in the fact the pains of not running are even more unbearable. Therefore, runners must start working as a team and community to prevent injury to all in the running community by taking measures to ensure the risk does not increase by allowing the new harmful trend to take over. Determination is one of the most important traits of a runner and it is what allows a runner to run marathons and keep fighting. Runners use determination to continue running through the pain and should only be fighting the pain of their body telling their mind to stop not their doctors. Robert Kennedy Jr., an American distance runner once holding many records in running, once said, “One thing about racing is that it hurts.  You better accept that from the beginning or you’re not going anywhere.”
